


The Ghosts That Haunt You

by CavannaRose



Series: Jessica Jones Fics [1]
Category: Jessica Jones (TV), Marvel Cinematic Universe
Genre: Alcohol Abuse/Alcoholism, Gen, Introspection
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-03-08
Updated: 2016-03-08
Packaged: 2018-05-25 14:21:49
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 3
Words: 1,204
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6198475
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/CavannaRose/pseuds/CavannaRose
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Kilgrave is dead... Isn't he?</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

3:30am and Hell's Kitchen was about as quiet as it got. Jessica sat at the desk in her 'office' ... though could she really call it that anymore? She hadn't taken a case... since Luke, but did that really count? Perhaps it would be more honest to say Hope had been the last case she had actually taken. Even Trisha had stopped calling, which was probably better for them both. Running a hand through her greasy hair, Jess tossed the empty whiskey bottle across the room. If she had been an alcoholic before... now she was simply drowning. With a grunt, she tipped herself out of her chair, taking a few stumbling steps through the morass of bottles that carpeted the floor.  
  
She stepped on a plastic cap, scattered amongst the refuse, and the loud cracking noise froze her. Closing her eyes against the bombardment of images, she stumbled back until her back hit the wall. Once more she was there at the docks, his head in her hands... that note of finality echoing in the night. That moment where a body goes from living to dead in your hands... she was getting achingly familiar with the feeling. Biting back a sob she wrapped her arms around herself, sliding down the wall until she was simply sitting there... not crying, not doing anything, simply staring emptily into space.  
  
Jessica sat there, unresponsive, for hours. Catatonia was a blessing, it made the guilt go away better than all the alcohol she had consumed. If she had her choice, she would have stayed like that forever. Blissful oblivion. Nothingness. Anything was better than the monster she thought she was becoming. The monster Luke had seen when he learned about Reva. The monster that Kilgrave had so passionately craved control over. Shuddering she shook herself out of it.  
  
No.  
  
He wouldn't win. She looked around her apartment, disgusted with herself. If she was just going to give it all up... she might as well have given into that purple-obsessed ass. Angrily she dragged herself to her feet, kicking a broken bottle across the room. Enough was enough. He had needed killing. She had owed Hope that death, had owed it to everyone who had been hurt by the sociopath because she hadn't been able to beat him sooner. Maybe she'd look up the so-called Devil that had been spotted around Hell's Kitchen. Do what Trish had wanted her to do from the beginning, be a bloody superhero.   
  
Not like the ones everyone was talking about... like the defrosted Captain America, she could never be that... good. But that wasn't what Hell's Kitchen needed. The Devil knew that. It needed something harsher, something grittier. Jessica could do that. She stared down at her hands. Hands that had killed twice now. She was way more than capable of doing that. Once more she ran her hands through her hair, this time actually feeling the filthy buildup that neglect had caused.   
  
First thing's first, she needed a shower and a garbage bag. Enough self-indulgence for one lifetime. He didn't get to win. She'd mourned for the part of her that had never chosen to kill another person, it was time to move on. Be something bolder. Something better... Though right now she'd settle for something that smelled less like they'd died.


	2. Chapter 2

Jess had newspaper article clippings spread from one end of her 'office' to the other. Pinned to the walls, piled on her desk. They seemed to be never ending. Most of them were trash. Anything that labeled her as a 'hero' was crumpled up in a pile surrounding the garbage can. What really had her frustrated were the photographs. Purple graffiti on a hundred different walls. Every piece of it declaring one word. "Smile."   
  
It was impossible that the message was for her. That it was from him. He was dead. She'd felt the life drain out of the monster. There was no possible way... Besides, the missing people were children. He hated children, didn't have a use for them... at least that's what she told herself as she stared into the gap-toothed photograph of a little boy, couldn't have been more than seven, but she wasn't the greatest judge of age.  
  
She'd called the papers, looking for their source, and finally came up with a name. Joshua Chapman. Meeting with him hadn't given her much, but she could see it in his eyes. He'd encountered Kilgrave. There was the fuzziness to his memory that she associated with the purple-obsessed psychopath.  
  
Furious, Jess kicked her desk, sending it shooting across the room, smashing into the wall. She was at her wits' end. How did she go about finding him this time? He'd changed the game, or she had when she'd killed him... but what did he expect? He'd made her into a killer, it was only fitting that he should reap the rewards of what he'd created.  
  
She had to get some feelers out there, let him know she was on to him. Pulling out her phone, she called in an ad to the 'Missed Connections' section of the newspaper.  
  
 _To the Gentleman from Hamlin_  
 _I need not expect to hear your song again_  
 _I might not know what you are up to but I am watching._  
 _No mountain is high enough, I will find you._  
 _Our last dance ended so well, Encore?_


	3. Chapter 3

Jessica hounded the police station after the children committed a robbery. She was there from open to close, shooting off an endless stream of questions, until a frustrated sergeant threatened to have her evicted from the precinct... rather loudly. His derision over her theories that the tagging and robbery were connected echoed over the desks of the junior officers... as did her aspersions as to his level of intelligence.  
  
As she was stomping out, though, a young officer identifying himself as Kalam approached her. She found him rather cautious and retiring for an officer, but he did have the best clue she'd gotten in awhile. She gripped the partial plate in one hand with fire in her eyes. She had a favour owed from a hacker, he'd get her into the DMV files. This Kalam's description of the man in the van though ... She shuddered. There was no one it could be besides Kilgrave.  
  
She submitted the partial to her guy, then went home to shower, change, and compose another message. She was starting to get real irritated with the games the man was playing. At least the Missed Connections thing had worked last time. For this one she took a whole stanza out of Browning's poem, modified slightly of course.  
  
 _So Kevin let me and you be wipers_  
 _Of scores out with all men -- especially pipers!_  
 _And, whether they pipe us free from rats or from mice,_  
 _If we've promised them aught, let us keep our promise!_  
 _I'll be waiting where it started, should you dare._  
  
With a grim smile she submitted the ad for the next day's paper. She'd wait all day to see if he showed up, but for now she'd get some rest, then swing back around to her friend's place to see if the licence plate partial gave any clues whatsoever.


End file.
